Absolution
by Holly Unending
Summary: A rich young girl hires the gang to break into her own mind and recover a suppressed memory. Slight A/A will ensue.
1. I will pursue this dream

**ch1/I will pursue this dream**

**A/N:** Any comments or critiques would be much appreciated! I've only seen _Inception_ twice so I'm still working on getting the characters down. [PS: The opening is unintentionally ambiguous. XD I'm too much of an optimist to believe the worst of the movie's ending.]

* * *

Cobb is gone. This is a truth acknowledged, however quietly, by every dreamer lounging in the warehouse. Arthur is reading the paper. Eames is having a drink while polishing his pistol (perhaps not, Ariadne thinks, two activities which should be practiced simultaneously). Yusuf is sprawled out on one of the lounge chaises, muttering to himself over some sheet of paper.

Ariadne is spinning a top.

_His _top.

This is the sound of the empty space Cobb left.

Finally Ariadne can't help but ask. "Are we waiting for a job?"

"No," Eames says. Arthur raises his eyes from the paper. "No more _jobs._ In case you didn't notice, we barely escaped that last one with our lives, let alone our sanity." It's been a week, though, and the job—_The Job_, as it now seems to be said—is becoming something like a half-remembered dream. Something that changed them, each in his or her own way, but is moving away from the front of their minds. A tattoo they can no longer feel the sting of.

"I think we make a pretty good team," Ariadne says. The top tips to the ground and rolls in a wide circle; she starts it spinning again. Good old reality.

Arthur quirks a smile. "Then what will you do now? Are you going to go back to France? Finish your studies to be an architect?" The top falls.

It sounds absurd—the thought that she still needs to study. That she should go back and sit in an uncomfortable chair and be babbled at in French till her eyes droop, that she should slave over ridiculous and pointless and superfluous projects, stay up late building tiny perfect models which no one will ever really care about, and finally find sleep just as the sun rises…sleep without dreams…

"I dunno," she says. "I…don't really think I have anything left to learn from that place."

"I've often felt that way about France," Eames says.

Ariadne smiles at him from under her dark hair, but she isn't done. "When we went into Fischer's head, we didn't just make some money and build some pretty places. We _changed _things—for Fischer, and for ourselves. We grew. I've never had an experience like that, and, well, I don't want to stop now. I want to keep being your Architect."

No one misses that this line is directed at Arthur—not even Yusuf, who hasn't been fully _there_ since he received some ten million dollars in cold, hard cash.

There is a long silence. Eames finally says, "If we got a job—_if_ we got a job—and it paid a lot and wasn't more than a couple layers deep, I could be your forger." That nets him a real smile from Ariadne, bright and sweet. "_If._"

"I have all the money I ever dreamed of," Yusuf chortles. "Count me out!"

"Yusuf, at the rate you're spending, you're going to be looking for work in a matter of days." Arthur points a thumb at the hot yellow Mustang shining in the corner of the warehouse.  
"If not hours." Eames's glance includes the home theater system (not yet assembled), Jacuzzi, and full-size yacht. "Out of curiosity, exactly _how _do you plan to get that back to your house?"

Yusuf shrugs. "Money will find a way, believe me."

"'All the money you ever dreamed of'…please, honey. You need to dream a little bigger than _that_."

"This is the part where he pulls out his bazooka," Arthur mutters to Ariadne.

"I sure hope not."

Then there is a knock at the door.

For a moment this does not seem to fit into their reality. They are in a warehouse, abandoned for all that the people of New York know (excepting, of course, the men who delivered Yusuf's newest spoils). No one knocks at a warehouse and, more to the point, no one knocks at an empty warehouse.

"Expecting another toy?" Eames hisses at Yusuf, who shakes his head. Ariadne has a moment of jolting panic and Arthur tips his chair so all four legs are firmly on the ground. _The police?_ Then the moment passes. Like the police would knock politely.

Maybe they imagined it.

_Knock, knock, knock._

Or maybe not.

"Come in?" Ariadne calls, though it's clear from the others' faces that they don't think inviting Mystery Person X in is a good idea.

The warehouse door budges a fraction of an inch, sending a beam of pure light slicing across the floor. Then there is the distinct sound of someone struggling against a heavy weight. Ariadne scrambles up off the floor to help, but Arthur puts a hand in front of her and nods. He'll handle this. He strides over to the door and heaves it open. On the other side is a girl who can't be older than eighteen.

"Whhhhhewwww." Eames sighs in relief and drops his pistol back in his lap. "Who the hell knocks at a warehouse?" The girl is too far away to pick this up, fortunately.

She approaches them with light, echoing steps, the sound of her tiny feet overshadowed by Arthur striding after her. When she reaches the circle of their chairs, she stops. The Mustang and the yacht receive appraising glances. Then she turns her attention to the people who have been staring at her like a space alien since she first walked in.

Ariadne speaks first. "Um, can we help you?"

"Is there a Mister Cobb here?" she asks.

The team exchanges swift glances. "He's not available at the moment," Ariadne says. "What seems to be the problem?"

"I was hoping to hire him."

Ariadne can see from his face that if Arthur had been leaning back in his chair, that sentence would've been as good as a kick. The short, slim young girl standing in front of them with her chin up high is dressed in immaculate designer clothing, from the gray cap perched lightly on her golden hair to the Coach sneakers laced neatly up her ankles. She belongs in a mansion, or maybe Yusuf's yacht. She does not belong in the shady business dealings of the subconscious.

"What kind of job?" Ariadne manages to ask; the girl seems to be addressing her.

The girl hesitates. "Do you know Mister Cobb?"

"He's my boss. This is the rest of his team…his associates."

"Then you should know as well as I do the reason I came. I've heard that he specializes in a very specific type of security."

"Subconscious security," Arthur fills in.

Now she turns and smiles at him. "Yes. Don't worry, I have the money to pay whatever fees are required."

"What kind of money, exactly?" Eames asks with a casualty bordering on criminal.

"Well—I'm Sophia Wagner of the Wagner family, and I recently came into my inheritance."

Arthur whistles. "The Wagner Steel Industry is worth billions."

"And all of it is locked up nice and safe at home," she says hurriedly. Yusuf frowns and sits back in his chair. "But I will pay out, if Mister Cobb can fulfill my request."

"Uh, see, that's the problem." Ariadne looks at Arthur. "Mister Cobb is spending time with his family right now."

"I can wait."

"A lot of time."

Sophia raises one perfect eyebrow. "A permanent time?"

"Maybe," Arthur admits.

"Hmm." She frowns. "I hadn't counted on that." The seconds tick by as she thinks to herself. Arthur tries to communicate some silent question to Ariadne, who makes a mental note to tell him that he must never become a mime, and then Eames wants to know what's going on and the girl's deep reflection is interrupted by the scraping of chairs and irritated whispers. "Okay!" she says loudly, and they all shut up. "You're his associates, right? You're as good as he is?"

"We can get the job done," Eames says.

"This may not be something you've ever done before," she cautions. "It's likely no one's ever done it."

"Try us."

"I want you to break into a mind and recover a memory."

"Memory," Arthur says. "That's questionable territory. We might have to recreate where it took place to draw the memory out, and that could cause problems for all of us. But it's possible."

"Especially if the money's good," Yusuf pitches in.

Ariadne still has questions. "Is it a vivid memory?"

She shakes her head with a quirked smile. "I don't know. I would imagine so."

"An old memory?"

"Six years."

"Who's the target?"

"Me," she says, and smiles.


	2. upon this winding road

**2/upon this winding road**

**A/N:** THANK YOU SO MUCH to everyone who commented, faved, and signed up for story alerts. I love you more than Eames loves "kicking" Arthur. Durrr Sophia talks a lot in this chapter. Sorry. Will update again soon! [P.S. Changed Sophia's age to 18. : ) Sorry for the confusion.]

* * *

_That_ manages to throw even Eames for a loop.

"Wait—you—I'm not sure you quite understand how this whole 'subconscious security' thing works."

She blinks. "You don't break into people's minds?"

"Well, no, that we do, it's just—"

"You can't recover a memory?"

"That should be easy enough, but you—"

"You're not available for hire?"

"That's not the issue either, _would you listen?_" The Brit's lips are pressed thinner and thinner as his patience wears. "The general idea is that you hire us to recover information for you, which I—suppose—you're not really contradicting. But a client _usually _hires us to retrieve top secret information from an enemy."

"So the _enemy_ part is different, but the information could be considered top secret anyway. It's a suppressed memory, after all."

"But that will mean you and your subconscious know exactly what is going on. It's like hiring us to rob your own bank. Your security will obviously know what's coming!"

"Sounds like a real opportunity for you to put your forgery skills to the test," Arthur says, and smirks at Eames.

"It's not forgery skills I need to accept this job, it's sheer stupidity!" But he's relaxing into the idea of a real (well-paid) challenge. "I'd have to be stupid to accept and a genius to survive. Though…it's not impossible, now that I think about it. The surviving part at least."

Arthur rolls his eyes. "Don't push it, _genius_, you got your compliment from me last job around."

Eames sends him a frosty glare. "Yes, fanks, you're such a flatterer."

Sophia, meanwhile, waits patiently for the bickering to end. "Does that mean you'll accept?"

"I'll consider it, at least," Eames says. Arthur nods. Yusuf shrugs.

"I'd like to know a little bit more," Ariadne says. "But I'm not really sure where to begin. Can you maybe walk us through the time surrounding the missing memory?"

"If you think it'll help," she begins, but that's as far as she gets before Arthur interrupts.

"Wait a minute." He starts toward the newspaper he'd thrown down. "Sophia Wagner. Heiress of the multibillion-dollar Wagner Steel Industry. But…" The paper crumples under his fingers as he throws down section after section, searching. Then he finds it. "'The Skeleton in the Steel Closet.' I knew I'd seen your name recently."

"How long is it going to take for that stupid story to go away?" Her voice isn't much louder than an appropriate indoor voice, but the hugeness of the warehouse swallows it and makes it echo. "My father managed to keep it quiet for six years, and suddenly every two-bit reporter thinks the world wants to know their stupid theory."

"It's no coincidence this hits just as you come into your inheritance, is it?" Arthur says slowly. "Who all knew about it?"

"Knew about _what?_" Eames asks.

"My kidnapping."

Well, she has everyone's attention now.

"Who knew?" Arthur repeats into the stricken silence.

"The family, a few close friends, police, trusted private investigators. And the kidnapper, of course. But the 'incident' came at a bad time; my father couldn't afford to appear distracted, couldn't reveal that there was a weakness within the company. It was kept very, very quiet. They say money talks, but it also silences—if you have enough of it."

"I think you better start from the beginning," Ariadne says, when she's absorbed the unexpected information. A six-year-old memory and six-year-old kidnapping? No way is that a coincidence. "Er…have a seat?"

"Thanks." The girl flashes a self-conscious smile before perching on the edge of one of the lounge chaises. It's a strange, surreal moment for Ariadne—to comprehend that the girl who could easily blend into the sea of her peers in a French classroom is not only filthy rich, but also the victim of a kidnapping. But strange people don't have to look strange, she supposes, and gives a mental shrug.

They are short one chair, now, though Ariadne doesn't realize it until there's a sudden warmth against her side: Arthur. He smiles cheekily at her, as they sit hip to hip, and says softly, "Mind sharing?"

"No." But she gives him a look which is supposed to say she knows what he is up to. She has a very bad feeling it comes off more as, 'You can share my lawn chair anytime.' She does not have an opportunity to worry much about this, and anyway Arthur doesn't seem to mind as he shifts so her shoulder fits more easily into his shape.

Sophia begins. "I've relived that day a thousand times inside my head. But it was six years ago, you know. It's like if you say a word too many times, and it doesn't sound like a word anymore…sometimes I'm not sure if the details are real or just a figment of my imagination."

"Just tell us what you can," Arthur says. Ariadne can feel his voice thrumming through his chest, against her back.

"Let's see." She takes a deep breath and folds her hands, crosses her legs. It strikes Ariadne suddenly that this is not to look proper so much as it is to keep herself from shaking. "I was twelve at the time. I'd just cut my hair as short as it could go, and my mother was furious with me. She loved my hair long. She'd always braid and unbraid it while she told me about her day."

Eames' quiet cough is spectacularly eloquent: _As much as I adore hearing about your hair…_

"Sorry." She still looks annoyed. "The important thing is that it was the cause of our fight. It started off small enough and I thought I could wait it out, let her calm down, but she kept yelling and yelling at me, saying these terrible things, and finally I couldn't take it any more. I ran out of the house, down the street, not even thinking where I was going. I just sat down on a street corner and cried and cried and cried. I was so mad. I kept swearing to myself that I wouldn't go back to that house anymore. I swore it in blood."

"In _blood_?"

"It was something I'd learned from a childhood friend—Ian. I mean," she laughed a little, seeing their faces, "it wasn't a puddle of blood or anything. I didn't write a novel with it. I just pricked my finger and swore that from then on, I'd be true, um, to…"

"To who?"

"To myself." She put a hand to her face. "Geez, that sounds really cheesy. I was twelve, you know. And all worked up. That moment, the moment when I saw blood on my finger, that moment is very clear in my mind. I could tell you what color shirts the people nearby were wearing, or exactly where the trash can was. The weather—it was sunny, but there were passing clouds—or what the traffic was like. After that, I'm not as sure."

"Whatever you can remember," Arthur repeats.

When she continues, her words are slower, more careful. "I remember pulling out my phone," she says. "I'd been texting Ian all morning, till my hands were shaking so bad, I could barely type. I pulled out my phone and wrote something like, 'I'm on the corner of 53rd and Main. Come save me.'" She put a hand to her forehead, squeezed her eyes shut so tightly Ariadne was worried they'd pop.

"I…I think I got a reply…I opened my phone again…and a car stopped near me, I remember that. A company car. I think someone called my name. There's…bits and pieces more…there were marks on my wrist when they found me, from where I'd been drugged, and I remember the needle going in. The kidnapper didn't know what they were doing, so it hurt a lot. There was a broken chair…I was tied to something…and…they kept touching my hair." She shuddered. "That's it. I can't even remember the bastard's face. And I have no idea what they did to me."

Arthur's quiet sigh ruffles Ariadne's hair and tickles her scalp. Her other side tingles with emptiness, half-dreading and half-hoping that his arm will come to rest around her waist or shoulders. Instead, he stands up.

"You understand that we'll need police reports, statements from family, background checks?"

"Yes."

"And that our methods may not be, oh, say…_legal_?" Eames asks.

She smiles. "I've done my research. I know what I'm getting into here."

"Then let's put it all on the table." Eames leans forward and his casual smirk belies the cold intelligence in his eyes. Arthur frowns at him, but doesn't say what's clearly on his face: _And when did _you_ become the Master Negotiator?_ "You would like us to recover the six-year-old memory of the truth about your kidnapping, correct?"

"Correct, Mister…?"

"Eames."

"Mister Eames."

"I assume this is partly to resolve the scandal the media is trying to stir up and partly for your own closure."

"Yes."

"Have you tried a professional therapist?" Arthur breaks in. "Not that I want to lose this job, but they are cheaper. And their methods are less invasive."

"I've tried, tried, and tried again. After staring at ink blobs for a certain number of hours, they sort of lose their effectiveness, you know?"

Ariadne didn't.

"Look, I've heard you're the best. Well, not you specifically, I suppose, but…within the corporate circle I've made a few friends who have highly praised Mister Cobb and company. If I can't have Cobb, I'll put my trust in _company._ This memory is more important to me than anything right now. And I have the money to reward you for retrieving it." She forces a game face. "Name your price."

Eames doesn't give the others so much as a chance to exchange meaningful glances. "Two million," he says, at the same moment as Yusuf shouts "Ten million!" (and is ignored).

"Two million?"

"Each." His smile, which might be described as gentlemanly in other circumstances, is nothing short of dastardly under his six o'clock shadow.

Sophia doesn't even blink. "Done. Who do I shake hands with?"

Ariadne senses the threat of a bloodbath as Arthur and Eames lock eyes, so she leaps to her feet. "Me." As they clasp hands, the architect looks her client and target firmly in the eye, trying to read her. Wondering what ugly demons they'll encounter inside her head. How many trains they'll have to dodge on ordinary streets. How many avalanches. How many malicious dead wives.

On the dead wives front, at least, she's pretty sure they're safe.


End file.
